


in my eye no star like thee

by QuickSilverFox3



Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Star Wars Setting, Bodyguard Romance, Flirting, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:27:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28267605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuickSilverFox3/pseuds/QuickSilverFox3
Summary: “A Jedi?” The stranger raised an eyebrow, Goodnight’s gaze drawn helplessly to the metal threaded through it, the flash of metal in his tongue when he spoke. “You brought a Jedi as a bodyguard?”
Relationships: Goodnight Robicheaux & Billy Rocks, Goodnight Robicheaux/Billy Rocks
Comments: 5
Kudos: 27





	in my eye no star like thee

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lazaefair](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lazaefair/gifts).



> Secret Santa present for Lazaefair!   
> Prompt: Star Wars AU with Billy/Goodnight (plus a little bit of "You seem a decent fellow. I hate to kill you." "You seem a decent fellow. I hate to die."
> 
> Please excuse my handwaving of some of the finer Star Wars details

Some habits were hard to break. It had been many years since Goodnight last wore a Jedi robe—he burnt his last one, staying and watching until the ashes were grey and cold and the tears dried on his cheeks—but the urge to clasp his hands in front of himself, the gesture normally covered by long sleeves, was one he couldn’t escape. 

He fought the urge to pace, restless energy coiling through him after days spent in constant motion—running from one ship to another, keeping his head down and barely able to breathe from the sheer pressure on his shoulders—but he couldn’t help but glance at the chronometer one more time. It had seemed like such a good idea when he had caught wind of the whispers that the political family of Creokath were looking for a bodyguard. 

Goodnight was tired. He was finally tired of running, and stability—although inherently dangerous—was swiftly becoming a necessity. The silence rang in his ears, broken only by the distant sound of running water from a fountain he was swiftly escorted past on his way in, the overflow water crashing down to the sea far below, and the rumble of droids passing in corridors that were built just out of sight. 

He could feel the man’s presence in the Force long before he heard the determined clunk of his boots, the echoing shouts of the attendants: bright and burning, a declaration of intent as subtle as a blastershot to the face, but there was something else there. The Force was muted to Goodnight now—a necessity, but it still ached like a lost limb—and it sparked against his nerves as he tried to peer deeper. 

_ Wait _ .

The whisper was in a language that Goodnight couldn’t speak, but he understood the intent, settling himself and turning to face the hidden door. It swung open a moment later—the seam blending in with the faceless metal wall—and a man swept into the room, surrounded by a sea of attendants and droids. 

“A Jedi?” The stranger raised an eyebrow, Goodnight’s gaze drawn helplessly to the metal threaded through it, the flash of metal in his tongue when he spoke. “You brought a Jedi as a bodyguard?”

“Former,” Goodnight rasped, his throat dry. His hands were trembling slightly in front of him, nails biting into his wrists as his grip tightened. He bowed, and paused halfway down at a gesture from the man as he stepped forward. 

The man’s boots were encrusted with dirt, worn in leather creased beneath the scales that covered them. From this angle, Goodnight could only see half of the others, the droid’s mechanical limbs stock still as their gears whirred and the nervous shuffling of the attendants delicate shoes. One pair stood out. The ribbons that coiled around their ankles—a marker of hierarchy that pulled at the recesses of Goodnight’s brain, the information escaping him even as he fought to remember it—didn’t lie flat. 

A cold thrill wrapped around Goodnight’s spine. He wasn’t skilled in interpreting the few visions the Force showed him, but he was a soldier. He knew what was going to happen, and—with a brief glance at the man who had the beginnings of a vicious grin pulling at the corners of his mouth—so did he. 

“Stand.”

At another time, Goodnight would have rankled at being ordered around so casually, but time had tempered the hot-headed apprentice he used to be. He straightened, feeling the bones grind in his spine, and met the man’s gaze fully. His eyes were dark, carefully outlined with barely smudged kohl, but there was steel in his gaze, and one hand was curled around an antique knife, hidden in the folds of his belt. 

“Why are you here, former Master Jedi?” He stepped forward, a slight twist to the movement—obvious bait—and the assassin took it. 

The Force screamed as Goodnight grabbed the plasma bolt to slow it, reverberations rattling up his arm as he felt the familiar weight of talons dig into the back of his neck, his lightsaber humming into life in his other hand, but the other man was faster. The knife sang as it flew through the air, and the would-be assassin fell into a crumpled heap, blood staining the pale fabric of their clothes.

It was instinct to move forward, to pluck the blaster—the metal burning the edges of his fingertips, the shape almost unrecognisable—from their limp hand and pass it behind him into a pair of waiting hands. The knife was more of a struggle, but came free with a sickening twist. Goodnight wiped it clean on a sleeve, dark red blood immediately staining the dusty fabric and turned to see the man crouched next to him, eyes locked on Goodnight

Goodnight offered the man his knife back, and felt his chest constrict at the grin he received in return. “I believe this is yours? And to answer your previous question, I believe you have a job opening. Two now at least.”

There was a chorus of barely stifled horrified gasps at his words, but the man’s grin only grew. 

“My name is Billy Rocks, Master Jedi. Welcome to Creokath.”

⁂

The low rumble of voices would normally be a comfort as Billy scrolled through his holo-pad, barely even reading his own notes—already firmly imprinted in his memory from countless nights of repetition to his audience of one, a soft look on Goodnight’s face that Billy felt terrified to read into—but now they were nothing more than an annoyance. 

He opened one application, closed it with an irritated flick of his wrist, then opened it again and saw that nothing had changed. Billy set the pad down on the table, settling his hands in his lap—slipping his fingertips into the hidden section of his belt to press them against the cold silver of the knives—and stared determidly at the opposite wall. 

His action drew some eyes towards him: a Mythrol with their dark blue skin nearly hidden behind their complex suit; a Zabrak, pausing in twisting one of their long braids around one clawed hand; and a Czerialan, pausing in their frantic tapping on their pad with electric green numbers reflected in her large glasses, but Billy didn’t move. 

“They’re saying the lockdown is going to remain at least for another hour, cher.” Goodnight slipped into the chair next to him, immediately settling into Billy—warm and sturdy, yet he would bend with only a word—and promptly stealing his drink. The whispers hissed around them like stray electricity, and Billy ignored it. People had been talking since the first day, when Goodnight handed Billy back his knife as if it was nothing, and they weren’t likely to stop. 

It would have felt strange, the almost easy camaraderie they had fallen into, but with Goodnight it felt as natural as breathing. Billy watched Goodnight out of the corner of his eye: the slow, languid bob of his throat; the almost lazy way he studied the crowd around them. Billy would have expected him to stand out more in a room like this, like a loth cat amongst birds, but he seemed to almost be born to it. 

That didn’t detract from the boredom Billy could feel radiate from him, throughout the long meetings. They weren’t bonded, although Goodnight had explained what he could remember to Billy during one stretch of time they were tucked into a single room while the alarms blared outside—Billy stretched out across the only bed next to the wall, while Goodnight knelt on the floor next to him, like something out of an old holovid—and his voice had been filled with wonder and no small amount of bitterness.

“What are your thoughts?”

“Currently,” Goodnight yawned, his jaw cracking and the golden replacement for two of his teeth causing the whispers to erupt once again, “I am wishing I got more food at breakfast.”

Billy turned his head fully towards Goodnight, catching the tail-end of his lazy grin where his head was tipped back against Billy’s shoulder. He carried the scent of woodsmoke with him and Billy sighed, sinking further into his seat.

“This assassin that has caused this lockdown—” Billy felt Goodnight stiffen slightly against his shoulder, registering the switch from Basic to Billy’s native tongue, one Goodnight could understand but tripped over the pronunciation of “—what are your thoughts on them?”

“My daddy always said that you don’t count your chickens before they hatch but…” Goodnight shrugged, the motion felt rather than seen, “They’re being surprisingly helpful.” 

He sat up, abruptly, head twisting towards the doors. Billy moved with him before he could think about what he was doing, turning to watch the other side of the room. The others shifted like trees in a breeze, heads twisting and turning this way and that, before they settled once more. The anticipation hung heavy in the air.

The door slid open with a heavy thunk, and Billy turned—settling his chin into the crook of Goodnight’s neck just to hear the other man hiss out a low breath, Billy’s beard scratching against his skin—to watch a protocol droid stumble in on shaking legs. 

“My sincerest apologies,” it began, the lights in its eyes blinking on and off, “But the current delay will continue until the sweep has ascertained none of you are in danger.”

“I am sensing,” Goodnight turned just enough to murmur into Billy’s temple, his breath warm against his skin, “That my job may be in peril with such amazing performances as this.”

Billy’s laugh was loud and unrestrained, shaking his head as they parted to sit fully in their own seats. Billy picked his pad back up, scrolling through the newsfeeds idly, but he reached across to tangle his other hand with Goodnight’s, the callouses on the other man’s hand matching his own.

⁂

_ Danger. _

Goodnight was on his feet and moving before he was fully aware of what was happening—sleep dragging unnaturally at his limbs, stumbling his way out towards the door. The air was thick in his lungs, a cloying sweet taste clinging to the back of his throat and he swore—voice rough and words slipping from Basic to every curse he had picked up in Mando’a. 

The headache he always received from sedatives was pulsing just behind his eyes, and he squeezed them shut as he stretched out to pick up his lightsaber. His fingers bumped against the cold metal of one of Billy’s knives—the small razor sharp hairpin he normally kept threaded through his bun—and Goodnight’s blood turned to ice. 

He reached out for Billy’s presence in the next room—not as bright as the sun, or as loud as a storm, but familiar to Goodnight in a way nothing else was—and found nothing. His hands were shaking too violently to use the concealed keypad, fingers slipping over the buttons in a way they never had before. 

Goodnight was a soldier, born and bred, and forged in war, and he was terrified at the thought of losing Billy. Attachment was dangerous, but he didn’t care anymore.

The door slid open, and Goodnight stepped into chaos, igniting his lightsaber with a single motion, bathing the room in a deep blue glow. It had horrified him in the early days of their companionship: the whirlwind of clothes that seemed to follow Billy whenever he relaxed even a fraction, but he had come to know better. His weapons were cared for with an almost mechanical precision, always carefully placed back into their holsters that hung from Billy’s hips, and his pack was neat and organised. It allowed Goodnight to slip minor trinkets into it when they travelled—a carved statue from Ket or a preserved flower from Plin Minor—while Billy pretended not to notice, except when he caught Goodnight’s hand, twisting their fingers together as they walked. 

Moving further into the room, careful to step on the bare patches of floor beneath the swathes of bright fabric, Goodnight’s eyes were drawn to the dresser and  _ there _ ! The woven ribbon he had pressed into Billy’s hand as it was tucked deep into his pockets from the chill, fingers bumping against the leather edges of his knives, and Billy had smiled, peeking at Goodnight out of the corner of his eye, was resting in a neat coil, undisturbed. Billy’s boots—the same worn pair from their first meeting—were missing from their place at the foot of the bed. 

_ Danger _ .

Goodnight closed his eyes, and began to walk, slowly at first but gaining speed. He couldn’t hear anything but the low sonorous ringing of the Force—alien and yet familiar, but the pain of using it burned down his arms, leeching the heat from his skin—and the low hissing gasps of his breath. The blaster fire was almost a relief, and Goodnight swung into motion, deflecting two bolts before his eyes snapped open.

The walls bore the distinct scorch marks of blaster-fire, the scent of burning ozone lying heavy in the air. Dust filled the air, billowing in from an open window and Goodnight’s breath fogged in front of him as he hissed through his teeth. The man that stood in front of him—crouched with one leg splayed out behind them, the foot twisted at an angle that made Goodnight wince—was a void in the Force, an absence that set Goodnight’s teeth on edge. 

He could feel the talons that couldn’t be real rest on his shoulders in sickening anticipation.

Over the course of his time with Billy, Goodnight had sat through more lockdowns than he had thought possible, with only the grins he could pull from Billy—all sharp edges and gone in a heartbeat—to sustain him, all because of an assassin working their way through the corrupt politicians who had slipped through the cracks. And here they were, helpless in front of Goodnight. 

The scattered remains of several security droids littered the ground like fallen leaves, the broken ends of wires sparking in the gloom, and, in the distance, Goodnight could hear the heavy tread of a second patrol group advancing. They would be here in mere moments. 

Goodnight stepped forward, bare feet knocking against the broken droid parts, and raised his lightsaber once more. Fear was a sensation he was used to feeling from opponents and his own men, a grotesque and twisted thing that caused bile to rise in his throat and sent him fleeing to the high spaces where everything was distant pinpricks forming when he viewed them down a scope.

The assassin didn’t flinch away as Goodnight drew nearer—their face, carefully hidden behind a distortion shield, dipping for a moment to watch his tread, fingers twitching in an aborted motion to reach out. He watched them carefully, eyes never leaving their hidden face as his feet knocked aside a still twitching arm.

As the droids rounded the corner, Goodnight moved, flipping over the downed man, lightsaber swinging in an arc to deflect the bolts fired. Behind him, he could hear the rustle of fabric as the man drew a knife from his belt and threw it with deadly accuracy. The droid stumbled backwards, sparks fountaining from the tear in its neck, feet skittering on the uneven floor as it fell. 

As Goodnight landed, a stray bolt glanced over his wrist, burning pain radiating through him and his lightsaber slipped from his hand. The blade spluttered out, deactivating as soon as it slipped free from his grasp, but Goodnight let it fall. Billy’s knife fit in his hand as if it had been made for him, and it flew through the air, guided by the Force—for once not filling him with a sense of dread twisting his stomach, but instead a calm confidence. The droid fell, and they were alone once. 

The assassin had pulled themself back to their feet, one arm braced against the wall for balance, but in their free hand, they held Goodnight’s lightsaber. He couldn’t see their face, but could feel the quiet wonder as if from far away, the sensation rolling over his skin like the air before a storm.

“Having fun without me, cher?”

Billy reached up to pull off the shield, still cradling Goodnight’s lightsaber, and grinned at Goodnight, piercings shining dully in the gloom. “I’m having more fun now that you’re here.”

“Are you all finished?”

Billy nodded once, straightening up but stopped, pain flashing across his face, teeth sinking into his lip to muffle the groan of pain. 

“How did you—” He stretched out his hand, offering Goodnight his lightsaber back. He took it, tracing his fingers carefully across the faint traces of warmth where Billy’s fingers had rested. He stepped closer, nose to nose with Billy, and carefully summoned the knives back, tucking them back into their holsters in his belt. Billy watched him, eyes blown so wide they were almost completely black. “How did you know it was me?”

“I didn’t. Not until I stepped forwards. You always worry about me too much.” Billy interrupted him with a scoff, gently tapping the top of Goodnight’s bare foot with one of his boots. “But I saw your boots. Distinctive.”

“Comfortable,” Billy countered, following through the lines of an old argument they had held many times.

“When I saw your room empty.” Goodnight broke off, all of his energy deserting him and he was helpless to do anything but press his forehead to Billy’s. Billy’s grip was steady on his shoulders, his nose bumping against Goodnight’s as they breathed in tandem, a brief moment of respite. 

“If you’re going to turn me in, can I get some bacta first?”

“What?” Goodnight drew back startled. Billy’s face was drawn with pain, his jaw set. “I’m not going to turn you in. We’re a team after all.”

Billy sagged in his grip with a sigh. He remained motionless as Goodnight moved to pick him up, cradling him close to his chest as he walked back towards their rooms, watching Goodnight through half-lidded eyes. 

⁂

The sunrise on the day that Goodnight was due to leave Creokath was a deep red, leaving trails across his eyes when he blinked. Exhaustion pulled at his bones, head still swimming with the alcohol he had drank the night before as he sat at Billy’s side for the last time. 

His term as a leader on Creokath was over. Goodnight was out of a job once again. He focused on that, rather than the absence that even the thought of leaving Billy had created in his heart. They had drunk, and laughed, and carefully not discussed the events of the last planet. Billy curled into Goodnight’s side, twisting his own rings onto Goodnight’s fingers and inspecting them in the flickering firelight. 

His room next door was empty, clothes piled over the floor. Goodnight swayed, hand pressed to his mouth as the emotion swelling in his chest threatened to drown him when he saw the small collection of trinkets Billy had amassed during their time together to be missing. 

Goodnight was a fool. He was a fool, and he was hopelessly in love. 

His limbs felt like lead as he stumbled down to the spaceport, barely able to raise his head to acknowledge the presence of the crowd around him. 

A pair of familiar boots stopping in front of him, made him pause and Goodnight raised his head to look into the full force of Billy’s grin. 

“I was worried you were going to get lost.”

“That was one time,” Goodnight responded reflexively, mind blank with shock. Billy was dressed in clothes similar to Goodnight’s own, well worn but sturdy with patches woven throughout the fabric. “What are you doing here?”

“Wherever you go,” Billy stepped closer. “I go.”

“It’s a rotten life,” Goodnight murmured. He reached out to twine his fingers with Billy’s, drawing them up to kiss them. 

“But I’ll be with you.” Billy kissed him then, warm and comforting and everything Goodnight didn’t believe he deserved. 

“You do deserve it,” Billy murmured against Goodnight’s lips, kissing him once more. “As do I.”

“Where shall we go first?” Goodnight asked, tugging Billy impossibly closer by his belt, causing his knives to knock together. 

“Wherever we want.”


End file.
